This morning, the rabbi spokeabout Jerusalem, looking grimbut alluding to joy. Grim,because as a child he had lost pointsin a trivia contest—Wrong, they said,Israel has no capital. He spoke bitterly,pridefully, and beside me, Jacob’s mouthopened, shocked that in this synagogueof more than a hundred good people,celebrating anniversaries, all would standto say strengthen the hands of the defendersof our holy land, the first floweringof our redemption.

The voice is the voice of a wise manbut the hands are of those who strip the dead.

*

Jacob lends me a book—Adonis’ Concerto al-Qudz.I read it by the window, in the dazzling lightof the sun on the snow. Women knitat their own tables. The veteran,in the corner, reads his newspaper. The hours swell, endlessin both directions, and I hear the voice of Jacob,calling out the coffee, while the voiceof the concerto calls out about Jerusalem,using names I’ve never heard for places I know well:Wadi Hilwa, Talat al-Dhuhour, the houses razedto build the plaza where I too,I admit it, sobbed, pressing my fingersinto the cracks in the stone,roosting places for pigeons at best.